A Clinton family ally reportedly tried to stop the publication of a book about a "deep state" plot to undermine President Trump.

Sidney Blumenthal, who was an outside political adviser to Hillary Clinton, claimed investigative journalist Lee Smith's new book was defamatory and sent threatening letters to publisher Center Street, a division of Hachette Book Group, according to a Fox News source.

But the source said the publisher's legal team found the threat to be "meritless," and the book, The Plot Against the President: The True Story of How Congressman Devin Nunes Uncovered the Biggest Political Scandal in U.S. History, was released on Tuesday.

As of Sunday, Blumenthal had not responded to the outlet's request for comment.

The book focuses on the "scandal" that began late July 2016 with the start of the FBI's counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign following a tip from an Australian diplomat about how Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos said the Russians had damaging information on Clinton.

Smith said the investigation, which was later wrapped into former special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation, was a "political operation designed to assist the Clinton campaign" during a Sunday appearance on Fox News' Sunday Morning Futures.

"We talk a lot about the FBI and DOJ and we’re right to focus on the very bad, likely criminal things they did. But it’s important to remember that the primary beneficiary was the Clinton campaign," he said.

The origins of the Russia investigation are now under criminal investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham.

Blumenthal worked with the Clinton Foundation and was an informal adviser to Clinton during her stint as secretary of state. Blumenthal has been a controversial figure, helping out with a “secret spy network” to give Clinton information on Libya.

The FBI used Blumenthal to corroborate the controversial dossier compiled by British ex-spy Christopher Steele that was used to obtain warrants to electronically surveil Carter Page, a onetime member of Trump's 2016 campaign, former Republican South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy said earlier this year.

“I have seen each factual assertion listed in that dossier, and then I’ve seen the FBI’s justification. And when you’re citing newspaper articles as corroboration for a factual assertion that you have made, you don’t need an FBI agent to go do a Google search,” Gowdy, who was a member of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a Fox News interview in May.

“And when the name Sidney Blumenthal is included as part of your corroboration, and you’re the world’s leading law enforcement agency, you have a problem,” Gowdy said.

Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined…. The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able might have a gun.”– Patrick Henry, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 5, 1778

“John Durham may be the most consequential and least known figure in Washington right now.

In May, U.S. attorney general William Barr selected Durham, a longtime prosecutor with a résumé so sterling it nearly glows, to investigate the origins of the special counsel’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, and whether it was properly predicated. Some Trump fans believe there was a vast effort by a “deep state” of high-ranking intelligence and law-enforcement officials to smear Trump or hinder his campaign by creating a perception of corrupt ties to Russia. In late October, the New York Times quoted unnamed sources who said that Durham’s probe had officially become a criminal investigation, meaning he now has the power to subpoena for witness testimony and documents, to convene a grand jury, and to file criminal charges…”

I read Jim Geraghty’s article on Durham, and am thoroughly impressed at Durham’s reputation for integrity and his ability to prevent leaks. I am also convinced that he is not working on an election timetable, and that his report will very likely not be completed until after the 2020 election.

_________________________ “I was guilty of judging capitalism by its operations and socialism by its hopes and aspirations; capitalism by its works and socialism by its literature.” — former socialist and later advocate of freedom Sidney Hook, born December 20, 1902.

_________________________ “I was guilty of judging capitalism by its operations and socialism by its hopes and aspirations; capitalism by its works and socialism by its literature.” — former socialist and later advocate of freedom Sidney Hook, born December 20, 1902.

Originally posted by sjtill:I read Jim Geraghty’s article on Durham, and am thoroughly impressed at Durham’s reputation for integrity and his ability to prevent leaks. I am also convinced that he is not working on an election timetable, and that his report will very likely not be completed until after the 2020 election.

He’s not doing a “report” - he’s doing an investigation. Only work product he needs to submit is indictments, then prosecutions.

The bulk of the article is about Svetlana Lokhova who was set up to make it look like she was having an affair w Michael Flynn.

Main culprits were UK Christopher Andrew and our old friend Stefan Halper.

David Ignatius is a Wash Post reporter who has written articles damaging to President Trump regarding the mythical Russian collusion.

In particular, Ignatius broke the story of the Flynn call to the Russian ambassador. Someone leaked that to him.

At the very end of the linked article, there is this:

After Halper was outed as a CIA and FBI informant in May 2018, Lokhova contacted Ignatius. In an email recently obtained by The Federalist, Ignatius replied to Lokhova that he’d “like very much to ask you about Stefan Halper.”

“When I said ‘Wow, he was your source,’ Ignatius hung up. We never spoke again.”

Ignatius also did not respond to questions about his use of Halper as a source.

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This raises the issue that not only was Halper spying on the Trump campaign for the FBI/CIA, and trying to implicate them as working w the Russians, Halper was also dumping his concoctions straight into the Wash Post.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.) said on Thursday that he does not think the identity of the whistleblower at the center of the House impeachment inquiry should be publicly disclosed.

Asked by reporters if he wanted the individual's identity to be made public, Burr told reporters that he "never" thought that.

His comments come as President Trump and some of his allies on Capitol Hill have called for the whistleblower to come forward and for the individual's name to be publicly released.

"[But] I think we should allow the president to know who the accuser is. And I think the whistleblower statute is being terribly abused here," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, told reporters earlier this week.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) also called for the media to publicly out the whistleblower during a rally with Trump in Kentucky — to the consternation of many of his colleagues — telling reporters: "Do your job and print his name."

Burr's committee is reviewing the process behind the whistleblower complaint, the handling of which created a high-profile split within the administration.

Burr, however, does want to speak with the whistleblower as part of his committee's investigation into the process.

Lawyers for the whistleblower have offered to have the individual provide written answers to questions under oath. But Burr told The Hill late last week that the setup was "not acceptable."

“We have a proven track record of protecting people's identity,” Burr added at the time.

earth to Richard. earth to Richard : ERIC CIARAMELLA. It's in the email I sent you

If you think we have the wrong guy, go watch the father's reaction when OAN news talked to him at the family home in Prospect CT

He added on Thursday that he believed the whistleblower's attorneys had done a "reversal" since they made initial contact about making the individual available.

"I just think that they were disingenuous when they ... sent us a letter saying how anxious they were to come before the committee," he added.

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The Senate Intel Comm still has not written that there was no collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign. To the contrary they produced a report that endlessly repeats how Russian social media efforts hurt Clinton and helped Donald Trump. Their report reads like an Appendix to the Mueller report.

This is the same "Intel" Comm that completely missed Joseph Mifsud, Stefan Halper, Azra Turk, and others who were FBI/CIA spies on the Trump campaign.

Burr and Warner have seen the full unredacted Carter Page FISA warrants. Nary a peep that the warrants contain significant lies.

Warner for months held secret communications w a lawyer representing Christopher Steele. Warner wanted a one-on-one mtg w Steele but did not want a paper trail.

Democrat Sen. Mark Warner, vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is holding up release of findings of panel's investigation into allegations of Trump-Russia "collusion." Report, which had been due for release in Sept, is said to fully exonerate Trump,advisers

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Paul Sperry is the one who released Eric Ciaramella as the likely CIA "WB"

Although Sperry doesn't provide proof of his claim about Warner, it is entirely consistent w Warner's biased / lying behavior throughout the last 3 years.

It is also consistent w the fact that Warner dominates the REP chair of the Sen Intel Comm - Richard Burr

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more Paul Sperry reports:

Eric Ciaramella's Internet footprint--including photos & bios--began to be scrubbed beginning in early Sept, after the National Intelligence director transmitted whistleblower letter to Congress, like the digital tracks of Dems' other"whistleblower" Christine Blasey Ford

Senate Intel Chair Richard Burr (R-NC) received letter addressed directly to him from the whistleblower. Burr knows his identity, 100%.

Not only could he officially unmask him, but subpoena him to testify. Of course, he'd 1st have to get the OK from the real chair, Dem Mark Warner

Pardon if this Nov 5 report has been previously reported here. I can’t find anything.

“Justice Department officials are trying to release in the coming weeks a potentially explosive inspector general report about the FBI’s investigation into President Trump’s 2016 campaign, according to multiple people familiar with the effort.

One person involved in the discussions said the target date for the report’s release has been Nov. 20, but another indicated that the Justice Department is unlikely to deliver it by then and that it is more likely to come after Thanksgiving because of the complicated and contentious mix of legal, classification and political issues at play…”

I'm pretty sure the DoJ IG report that is going thru the final stages is the one about the FISA warrants against Carter Page.

It is unclear if Horowitz addressed anything outside of that.

There is a possibility that the Carter Page warrant was used to widely monitor a number of others in the Trump campaign.

CTH has a post up that the FISA warrant authority is up for congressional approval in December. CTH wrote that perhaps DoJ wants to get the approval before the report comes out and describes a lot FISA abuse.

Ben Wittes is the guy who founded the Lawfare group. They are collectively working to bring down Donald Trump.

Wittes sent this today:

Why did Wittes do this ?

I think the story of the Strzok / Page texts went something like this (my guess at connect the dots):

The FBI was investigating leaks to the press in spring of 2017. There were 2 leaks to Devlin Barrett at the WSJ (he is now at Wash Post)

The investigators asked McCabe if he had any idea who had leaked to Barrett. McCabe said he did not.

What the investigators didn't know at that time was that McCabe himself had orchestrated the leaks to the WSJ. He gave guidance to Lisa Page and Mike Kortan, and those two actually talked w Barrett.

When the investigators got to Lisa Page and asked her, it seems she told them McCabe had authorized the leaks. Don't know how hard they had to press her.

She was told McCabe had said he didn't know who had leaked. Perhaps they put some heat on Lisa Page that she was lying. She showed the investigators text messages that supported her position.

That opened the Pandora's box. Page and Strzok used their govt phones for a lot of the texts. One report was that there 70,000 of them. But once the investigators saw the texts about the leaking, they could examine the phone as much as they wanted to because it was govt property. Then they found the Strzok/Page tens of thousands of texts.

The investigators didn't tell McCabe about the texts until 28 July 2017. About 3 days later McCabe told the investigators he now remembered that he had authorized Page and Kortan to leak the stories.

As best we know at the moment, it was the investigation of the leaks of the 2 WSJ stories that broke open the existence of the texts and led to McCabe being fired for lying about it.

Kash Patel, a senior National Security Council official accused of running a secret backchannel to President Trump on Ukraine matters, has categorically denied ever discussing Ukraine with the president.

What he's saying: "A number of media outlets have falsely reported that, as senior director for counterterrorism on the National Security Council, I have communicated with President Trump regarding Ukraine," Patel told Axios on Friday night. "At no time have I ever communicated with the president on any matters involving Ukraine.

"Any reporting to the contrary, and any testimony provided to Congress, is simply false, and any current or former staff who suggest I have raised or discussed Ukraine matters with President Trump, are similarly misinformed or spreading outright falsehoods."

Why it matters: Trump's former top Russia adviser, Fiona Hill , told impeachment investigators that she heard Trump thought Patel was his Ukraine director and that Patel was slipping Ukraine-related "materials" to the president outside of the normal NSC channels. Patel has never been assigned to Ukraine on the NSC.

Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee seized on Hill's allegations about Patel, who previously worked for ranking member Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and who helped write a memo that accused the Russia investigators of bias

Between the lines: Hill said that when she heard from another NSC staffer about Patel's supposed involvement on Ukraine, she considered it to be so "strange" and alarming that she reported it to her superior.

Hill said, however, that she never found out what actually went on with Patel and that her superior, Charles Kupperman, never got back to her after telling her he'd look into the matter.

Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, an NSC official who testified before impeachment investigators, also mentioned Patel in his testimony.

Vindman testified that Hill told him that Patel was misrepresenting himself as an Ukraine expert and the president had come to believe Patel was in charge of Ukraine policy on the NSC.

In a statement Friday night, Patel categorically denied all of these allegations from his current and former colleagues.

"I pride myself on my record as a dedicated national security professional who is entrusted to handle our nation's most sensitive matters," he said. "At no time have I strayed from my mission to protect the homeland in service to President Trump and the National Security Council."

“Former Republican Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz offered a possible explanation for the delayed release of the Justice Department inspector general report on alleged Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act abuses.……"I don’t think it has anything to do with Horowitz delaying it," said Chaffetz, who is a Fox News contributor, on the network this week. "I think it’s the fact that Durham actually is moving forward on some prosecution." …”

"I don’t think it has anything to do with Horowitz delaying it," said Chaffetz, who is a Fox News contributor, on the network this week. "I think it’s the fact that Durham actually is moving forward on some prosecution." …”

I hope Chaffetz is right...Of course, we have all been waiting patiently for the tide to turn and for the real deep-state criminals to be indicted.Not holding my breath.

"Some things are apparent. Where government moves in, community retreats, civil society disintegrates and our ability to control our own destiny atrophies. The result is: families under siege; war in the streets; unapologetic expropriation of property; the precipitous decline of the rule of law; the rapid rise of corruption; the loss of civility and the triumph of deceit. The result is a debased, debauched culture which finds moral depravity entertaining and virtue contemptible." -- Justice Janice Rogers Brown

"The United States government is the largest criminal enterprise on earth."-rduckwor